Pokemon Amber
by Marshith
Summary: When The Johto regions passes The Amber act. A law designed to draft underperforming children into The Pokemon league. Several players begin jockeying for power in the ensuing chaos. This story follows the life of one trainer caught in the center of a much larger game.
1. Prologue

_This story is highly inspired by the Pokemon 0 story by Afroshock. If you haven't read it then I highly recommend it. Unfortunately, his stories have not been updated in years and I am unsure how to properly reach him. No characters from the original will appear here, and apart from a mention by name._

* * *

 ** _Prologue:_**

Each ant emerged from the skull bearing an infinitesimal portion of brain matter. The double thread of ants shuffling between corpse and nest crossed at a diagonal the human trail beside which the murdered woman had been thrown. As a shadow crossed the morning sun, a dozen ants became crushed beneath the leathery bare feet of six boys plodding down the trail from the road toward the lake, each bearing a sixty-kilogram sack over his head, none of the scrawny youth weighing much more than the luggage they carried. The surviving ants continued their portage, undisturbed. So did the men. Farther downslope, the path ended in a tangle of foliage at the edge of the bay, with a lake visible beyond. The six boys dropped their sacks and sprawled beside them for a short rest, using the sacks as pillows. The oldest smoked a cigarette: three others began chewing on gnarled stalked of sugarcane; another scratched insect bites around his missing toe.

A helicopter flap-flapped by, very loudly, and the group became eerily still, looking up through the screen of leaves and branches as the big olive-green chopper went by, like a bus wearing a beanie. It was the same sort used by the armed forces to land troops to battle, but the markings desecrating its exterior showed it was no longer piloted by soldiers. Three black men in overalls and tank tops crouched in the broad doorway in the chopper's side peering down at the lake. The man in the center gently running his fingers through the feathers of a Talonflame perched on his shoulders.

The six smugglers, invisible beside the trail, watched and listened without reaction until the helicopter chuff-chuffed away across the sky, westward into the brush. Then they all talked at once, with a nervous enthusiasm, agreeing the helicopter had been a good omen. Having just searched this area, it was unlikely to return for some time. And how lucky they themselves hadn't arrived twenty minutes earlier; by now, they would have been visible and helpless on the open water. Since luck was with them, they should seize the moment. Their two canoes were dragged out of hiding-the rifles safe within, the ancient, untrustworthy outboard motors still attached at the rear of each boat-and were pushed into the water. The sacks were loaded, the men arranged themselves three to a canoe, and they proceeded slowly out across the bay, southward, the motors stinking, the low morning sun in the eastern sky stretched their shadows across the calm water.

Forty minutes later they had progressed fifteen miles, heading east now toward the narrow strait between the mainland and an island. The border between Johto and Kanto a line seen only on maps-bisected the bay, and not far beyond lay the tiny, unimportant village of Erdin, their tended landfall. A much shorter route for smuggling lay directly across the bay but the shore there was heavily patrolled this year. And because so many floodlight-bearing helicopters prowled the border at night, the risky daytime passage had become safer.

All six heard the chuff-chuff at once, over the nasal sputter of the outboard motors and looking over their shoulders they saw the giant thing sailing toward them through the sky, like something on wires attached to God's fingers. Heading the way, wings spread wide like an angel of doom was the Talonflame, its eyes no doubt fixed on their huddled bodies. There was no escape this time; they'd been seen, the helicopter was floating in a circle around them, its open doorway filled with pointing men.

It was guns they were pointing and then firing. The smugglers had been prepared for arrest, for some brutality, possibly for torture, but they had not been prepared to become target practice in a great bathtub. Two of them dragged old Enfield rifles up from the canoe bottoms and returned the fire. The chopper occupants, not expecting armed resistance, had flown too low and too close, the better to score hits on their fish in the barrel. Instead of which two men in the helicopter doorway staggered back into the darkness within, and the Talon flame that had been circling them above dropped like a full sack down from the air, crashing into the water beside a lone rifle. The helicopter, as though God had been startled at his play, jerked upward into the sky and tore away northwestward, toward land.

The youth in the canoes were now terrified. The helicopter would soon be back, possibly with others. There wasn't much time to reach that invisible line in the water and the dubious safety of Johto. To the left was the safety of Kanto, low dark folds of hills, but they were in great fear of returning there. Directly ahead mounded an island, ten miles long and a mile or two wide and covered in thick brush, but the soldiers would expect them to hide there and would have hours of daylight to search. To the right, a cluster of tiny brushy islands lay like suede buttons on the water; after a quick conference, the six agreed to make for one of these. They ripped open the sacks and dumped the contents into the lake, both to lighten the boats and to make it possible to deny that they were the coffee smugglers.

They chose an island at random, pulled the canoes well up from the water's edge, and covered both their boats and themselves with layers of the brush. But they were boys who had never been in the sky and were unaware of the clear lines the canoes had made in the mud and the brush, arrow shafts leading from the water directly to their hearts. When the helicopter did return within the hour and, after only the slightest hesitation, landed on the island of their hiding place, they could only believe it was devilry.

The officer in the helicopter was extremely angry. When the six boys were found and lined up in front of him, he beat their faces with his fists and lashed their arms with a piece of brush. They had killed one of his men, wounded two others, and cost him a well-trained scouting bird. It was a personal humiliation, an official disgrace, a blow to his hopes for military advancement. It was a blot on his copybook. The six denied they were smugglers, which only enraged the man more. He kicked at their legs with his boots, while an expressionless white face watched from the helicopter doorway. And when the contents of their sacks were found, the man turned cold and dangerous in his fury.

He ordered the six boys to lie on the ground on their bellies. He ordered his comrades to pour gasoline onto the sacks and to spread one sack on each prone person. Then he personally set the fires. The flames in sunlight seemed to dance midair, lightly, inoffensively, while the tan burlap darkened. The boys writhed and screamed beneath their burning blankets, and the rancid smoke rose into the clear sky as the white man in the helicopter lit his cigar. The men broke up the canoes, and then boarded the helicopter and were flown away, through the drifting smoke.


	2. Chapter 1: Home

**_Chapter 2: Home_**

Calem got back to the EAU just a little after 6. There was never enough room inside for everyone, so as usual there are more people standing out in front of the place than inside. All he saw was mothers and their children. No fathers anywhere. His seven-year-old brother, Troy, is playing with his basketball out in front of the building, throwing it up against the wall and catching it. His mother is outside as well, leaning against a van, smoking with a few other women. All of their belongings are packed up in one torn black suitcase and two garbage bags on the ground near her feet. He wants to ask if they have a place for the night, but all he does is glare at her and walk by without saying a word. He didn't have much to say to her anymore.

Troy threw the ball against the wall and it flew over his head into the street, He moved to chase after it without even looking to see if cars are coming, and his mom isn't even paying him any mind. Cal called Troy and he stops right before he got to the street. He went out to get it to himself, turning around just as Troy holds his arms up. "Ain't you too old to be running in the street for a ball?"

"I wasn't gonna run in the street," He says with his hands still in the air. "Come on, Cal, gimme the ball!"

"First tell me you ain't gonna run in the street no more."

"I said I wasn't, right?"

He made a move as if he was going to throw him the ball and watched him jump to catch it. Then he laughs and dribbles, just to mess with him a little. "Now tell me you ain't gonna take my stuff no more 'less you ask first."

"Okay, okay."

Cal finally threw him the ball, and then he walks back over to his mom. Just as he was going to ask her for money she says, "If you hungry, you better go on in there and get yourself something to eat."

"I ain't eating no more of that nasty EAU food," He tells her.

"Go to the store for me. Get you and your brother some chips or something and get me a Pepsi and a pack of juicy fruit."

"You think you can watch Troy this time?" He asked. "I mean, he only like ten feet away from you, and you not even watching him. He almost ran out in the street for a ball."

"He wasn't gonna run out in no street. He ain't stupid."

"Then why you got him in special ed?"

She ignored him. "And get me something sweet too." She added while handing him a five dollar bill.

The buses had already arrived by the time he made it back. Troy and his mother were doing exactly what they were previously doing. As if absolutely nothing had changed.

The bus was an old yellow school bus. Twenty-five people on board all going to the same motel. Two social workers from the EAU were on as well. Sitting in the front seat like they always do, talking to each other. He'd never once seem them look back in their direction. Figuring they'd prefer to socialize with each other than give the situation too much thought. Cal sat in the back along with all the other guys his age. Most of them talking about girls and cracking jokes. Acting as if they all weren't going through the exact same situation.

The mothers and young kids are sitting in the middle of the bus making the most noise. The younger kids are jumping from seat to seat playing some game. Troy was jumping around right with them, acting as if he didn't know any better. Most of the babies on the bus are crying. And the women on the bus are just talking and talking about nothing that mattered. Some woman is telling his mom about her landlord throwing them out just because they couldn't pay rent, and how she went to a fair hearing, but the judge took the landlords side because they both were white. Everyone on this bus got some excuse for why they were there. None of them was their own fault.

He should have known they would be going to the Bennett Motel. A few people he talked to told him about the place, joking that Bennett had rats the size of dogs. One boy saying his room had bullet holes in the walls and bloodstains in the carpet. Another said that the roaches were getting paid to run Bennett, that they checked you in and took you to your room, and that Bennett even hired roaches to come to your room to kill other roaches.

But he didn't find anything funny anymore. The place looked like a bombed out building from the outside. Inside it was no better. The place stunk like old shoes. That was the first thing Cal noticed. The next thing he noticed was how busted the lobby looked with old the old chairs and couches with holes and stuffing hanging out of them. The floors looked as if they had never been mopped before. In one corner were fast food wrappers and soda cans were strewn around an overfull trash can. In another was a small table with wilted flowers to tie the whole room together.

The women line up at the front desk to sign their families in. Troy stuck close to him and even the guys from the bus weren't cracking jokes anymore. The second they got into their room, his mom shook her head. "Cal, can you believe this shit? Why they got us here? I got a seven-year-old _child_!"

He didn't bother answering. The whole situation was starting to get him to the point where he was better off with his mouth closed.

"How they gonna do us like this?" She asks. "They gonna have _children_ sleeping here for three nights? I don't get this."

His mom went on and on, and he stopped listening along the way. He was tired of her acting as if everyone was supposed to do everything for her all the time. It was the exact same situation as when his dad was around. She'd just sit and expect him to do everything for her and buy her all the things she needed. No matter how he got them.

Troy began to cry as Cal rummaged through the garbage bag and found some sweatpants for him to sleep in. "Go to bed." He told him after he had finished changing.

"I wanna watch TV."

"Just go to bed. You can watch TV tomorrow."

He watched him lay down on one of the beds and pull the blanket over his head. Cal sat at the foot of his bed, taking in the room in its entirety. It didn't have bullet holes or blood, but the paint is peeling and the rug is worn. There were two double beds in the room with blankets but no sheets, and the mattresses are torn.

His mom turned on him with her arms crossed over her chest. "What your lazy ass doing?"

"What's that s'posed to mean?"

"It mean, what you doing for this family? Why ain't you doing something so your mother and brother don't gotta live like this? "

For a second he tried to hold it in to avoid Troy hearing something that might upset him. But this time he just wasn't able to. Before he knew it he was off the bed, screaming back. "What I'm s'posed to do?"

"You never do nothing. Look at you. You don't go to school 'cause you too damn lazy and ign'ant. And when you do get your black ass to school, all you do is get in trouble, and I gotta go down there every other day to talk to that goddam principal."

"What else you got to do? Don't talk about lazy. What are you doing for this family?"

"You don't go to school and you don't even work. You damn near sixteen. What kinda man you gonna be? Some lazy ass nigga?"

He was in her face then. "What you want? You want me to go out there and deal? That what you want?"

"We wouldn't be at Bennett if you _was_ out there, would we? And now your dumb ass is getting dragged into this goddam program."

Troy was crying by then, and his mom moved away from him. She began to walk around the room like an animal trying to get out of a cage.

"Cal you gotta do something. This shit is serious now." She wasn't screaming anymore, but she looked mad and scared at the same time. "You walk around the streets claiming you some type of man but that don't make you a man, you understand? A man gotta take care of his family. "

"Well, what your man doing for this family? You want me to take care of you 'cause your man can't keep his ass outta jail. That's your problem."

He snatched up his cell and his jacket, opened the door and left. He got in the hall and resisted the urge to slam his fist into the wall. He can feel the blood pounding his brain. He needed to do something. He wanted to go somewhere, but he didn't have anywhere to go.


	3. Chapter 2: A Pact

**So this chapter is dialogue heavy but I feel it's a necessary addition. The story from henceforth will alternate between characters. For example, there may be three chapters with Calem and then three with characters elsewhere. Also, I absolutely have to mention the review** **from** **St Elmo's fire who brought up a bunch of good points about the writing and grammar. A story of this kind taking place in Unova and Kalos doesn't make sense geographically so I will be changing the settings to Kanto and Johto.**

* * *

 **Chapter 2: A Pact**

Baron Chase, a man so steeped in his own villainy that the evidence of his evil now only amused him, paced the hotel-room floor like a pirate captain on his quarterdeck. "I am talking," he said, "about stealing a train."

"You must forgive my understanding." Mazar Balim requested. "You are suggesting the holding up of a train? Pursuant to its robbery?" A well-off merchant of fifty-three, he sat on the bed, round body and short legs, like Humpty Dumpty, blinking up at Chase.

"I am suggesting _stealing_ a train," Baron Chase said, smiling around his cigar, "pursuant to its rape." Secure in his power, giving Balim a moment to think, he paused in his pacing to look out the narrow slatted window with its view of the alley leading to Standard Street, where a rag-dressed woman now walking in the bright sunlight, clinging close to her body a small child struggling to skip ahead of her.

In taking this modest room in the rear of Hotel Chantreu, away from the conversational chatter and the traffic noise of North Boulevard, Chase had registered as James Martine, citizen of Nimbasa, Unova, representing the Monogram Bicycle Tire Company of that city, and furnishing a passport, Express card, and other documents in support of this identity. However, he dared not meet with Balim in either the first-floor cocktail lounge or the outdoor cafe, as "James Martine" would normally have done, but was forced to discuss the scheme with him here in this claustrophobic room, with its one comfortable chair that Chase scorned, while Balim sat like a fat obedient boy on the edge of the bed, watching with round-eyed patience.

"Where is this train?"

Turning from the window, withdrawing from his mouth the cigar he'd brought, Chase allowed himself to look both surprised and amused. " _Where_ is it? Don't you want to know what it carries?"

"Not necessarily," Balim said. "I am a businessman, Mr. Chase, which is a very small and cautious form of thief. I am prepared to remain small and cautious the rest of my days. I had enough of drama in my lifetime."

Several years before, in 1992 Abdul Saddique had initiated a political, economic, and underground war against the native-born residents and citizens of Kanto, forcing them to leave behind their family-owned businesses and documentation. Balim had been among those who traveled to escape the violence; because his mercantile trade had previously expanded into Johto, he had been luckier than most.

"That was before my time," Chase said. "I had nothing to do with that."

Balim shrugged. "You would have," he said. "It doesn't matter."

"I was elsewhere in 'ninety-two.," Chase said. "Working for one faction or another."

"Or even two at a time," Balim suggested.

"It carries goods," Chase said abruptly. "A train full of coffee, sugar, salt-"

"And?"

"And weapons." Chase's grayish pocked c=heeks grew gaunt when he drew on the cigar. "Current market value, about six million dollars."

"Six million dollars." Balim nodded. "A train full of weapons. The border between Kalos and Johto is closed."

"Of course."

"These are Kanto goods."

"There will be an airlift. Operating out of the border. It's being laid on by some Hoenn consortium, selling goods to people in Sinnoh to make up for their shortfall."

"My knowledge of the world is limited," Balim said. "I apologize for that. Why would Sinnoh have a shortfall in coffee?"

"Frost hit the crop."

Balim sighed. "God's diarrhea falls with equal justice everywhere."

"The train will cross the northern uplands," Chase told him, "stopping at each plantation to pick up the crop. By the time it reaches the border it'll be full. Then it travels the main line east to Johto."

Balim patted his soft palms against his round knees. His eyes were bright as he looked at Chase. he said, "And somewhere along this line, between Johto and Kanto, something happens."

"The train never reaches New Bark," Chase said.

"Ah, New Bark." For a moment, Balim looked nostalgic. "A lovely town, New Bark. A friend of mine once had a weekend farm near there. Fruit trees. Now gone, I expect. What happens to this train before it reaches New Bark?"

"You steal it."

"Ho-Ho," Balim said, laughing only with his mouth. "I do not, Mr. Chase. No, no, Mazar Balim is not a commando."

"Mazar Balim," Chase told him, "is a leader of men. You have employees."

"Clerks. Accountants. Drivers. Warehousemen."

"Frank Lanigan." Balim stopped, frowning, gazing past Chase toward the narrow open window. Street noises came faintly. Finally, he said, "Frank Lanigan did not discuss this with you."

Chase had returned the cigar to the corner of his mouth, and now he smiled around it, showing yellowed teeth. "You sound very sure of yourself. You believe Frank Lanigan wouldn't talk to me without reporting it to you?"

"Frank wouldn't willingly talk to you at all," Balim said. "Frank doesn't like you."

A little puff of cigar smoke obscured Chase's face; when the haze dissipated, he was calm and smiling. "Frank would like to steal a train."

Balim nodded his agreement. "There is that about him. A certain boyishness."

"I've known Frank for twenty years," Chase said. "Since the war. He's stupid, but he gets the job done."

"But what is your interest in this particular job, this train theft?"

Chase smiled. "Power."

"Doesn't Saddique pay you well?"

"Very well. In shillings and prostitutes, neither of which I can get out of the region."

"Ah."

"I'll tell you frankly, Mr. Balim," Chase said, with the intensity of a man who speaks frankly very seldom, "Saddique is running out his string."

Balim showed surprise. "Who is there to overthrow him?"

"The world," Chase said. "When you kill enough men or the right man, the righteous shall rise up and smite you."

"The boys smuggling into Johto. This only happened recently. You don't think that will blow over?"

"There's too much to blow over," Chase said. "He's getting crazier. He could even turn on me one of these days."

"An uncomfortable position."

"I'm forty-nine," Chase said. "When I signed on with Saddique, I was a kid in my twenties. My joints were never stiff, I could go without sleep for days and no matter how many people died around me I knew I was immortal."

"Visions of retirement," Balim said with a sly smile. "The rose garden. Even the memoirs, perhaps?"

"I want more out of all this than memories," Chase said, an underground savagery surfacing in an instant. "I've been in this fucking business for half my life. I want to take something away with me when I go."

Balim shifted slightly on the bed, as though he found Chase's own equilibrium. he said, "I'm in a position to set the thing up. You have the merchant contacts in Johto to move the coffee back into legitimate channels. You can finance Frank Lanigan in pulling the caper. You can arrange to bank my share for me. And you have a motive even stronger than money for getting involved."

Balim's surprise this time was certainly genuine. "I have? A motive stronger than money? What could this possibly be?"

"Revenge," Chase told him. "Most of these businesses Saddique now uses as his front used to belong to your brothers."

"Who stole them from the arriving immigrants once they were in debt."

Chase gestured irritably with the cigar; white ash fell on the rug. "The point is," he said, "Saddique stole them when he kicked your people out. It's Saddique's goods. It's Saddique's personal money. You can kick him one up the ass."

"Well, well." Balim rose from the bed, adjusting his neat round trousers. "You realize I can't give you an answer immediately."

"The train runs in three months."

"You give me much to think about," Balim said. "Including the idea that you find me sufficiently trustworthy to bank your profits for you."

Chase removed the cigar from his teeth so that his smile looked like the grin of a wolf. "You don't travel light, friend," he said. "You're a man of homes and shops and warehouses. You know very well, if you double-crossed me, how easy it would be for me to find you."

"I see," Balim said. "Spoken by a man who believes revenge is more important than money. I do see. We shall talk again quite soon. However," Balim stated. "there is one thing that I can not understand."

"I shall enlighten you."

"The weapons. Where do they go? How do they play into this?"

Chase's expression lightened as he examined the cigar in his fingers. "When the train goes down Nicholas will send as many barefooted children as he can to grab as many guns as they can into their little arms. Saddique's men will arrive and see their wages being stolen away by foreigners and open fire. Not even a king can order the death of two hundred children and expect no consequences."

Balim was silent and merely offered a simple. "Hm."

"It's just as I said Mazar. Enough men or the right man."


End file.
